Whole Foods is a great resource for Paleo Diet (and Primal) necessities. On the Friday before Labor Day weekend, Whole Foods held a sale on “Grass-Fed” ground beef. While steak is high on my list of good things in life I definitely love good ground beef. It’s very versatile and can be healthy and delicious in spite of it’s blue-collar image. When I heard about the sale I knew I would be making the trek to the nearest store. When perusing Twitter in the early afternoon I noted a couple of people complaining that the store where they were shopping was running low on the beef. So I hurried over there and managed to snag my maximum limit of ten pounds.

The beef at this particular location comes from a farm in Skillman, New Jersey called “Simply Grazin'”. I have become a bit wary of the phrase “grass-fed” so I checked out their website. Fortunately, as the name suggests, the cattle from this farm are raised organically and grass fed from start to finish (grass-finished). This means that the animals are treated more ethically and are eating the diet they were created to eat. It also means their meat and milk is far more nutritious. The Standard American Diet (SAD) leaves us with a terrible ratio of Omega-3 to Omega-6 fatty acids. Meat from grass fed animals is higher in Omega-3 fatty acid and lower in Omega-6 which can help in getting closer to the optimal ratio of 1:1. This fact is what makes spending a little extra money on grass fed meat well worth it to me.

Check out the beauty of the beef! I took this photo in the middle of the store – yes, I actually took my fancy camera in there to capture the moment. 🙂 My husband, G, and our boys, ran away in embarrassment but not before I snapped a shot of the meat with G’s Vibram Fivefingered foot in the background. They just don’t understand!
One of the main reasons I make the occasional trek to Whole Foods is to stock up on coconut products. I have been able to find some of these ingredients in other stores but I know Whole Foods is going to have a better and more reliable selection. Some of my favorites are virgin coconut oil, creamed coconut, coconut flour and shredded/flaked coconut. The day I went, the store was out of my preferred coconut flakes so I had to settle for shredded coconut. Whole Foods also carries reduced fat flaked and shredded coconut. But since fat is one of the main reasons I eat coconut I can’t imagine purchasing reduced fat versions.

My two little boys still eat some dairy (and G and I have been known to put heavy cream in our coffee) so if I make the trip to Whole Foods I will be looking for “pastured” dairy products. Here you can see Fage full fat yogurt which has twice the protein of regular yogurt. We also snagged some drinkable yogurt from grass fed cows as well as pastured whole milk and Half & Half. Ordinarily, I would have purchased heavy cream, not Half & Half, but they were sold out. My goal with any dairy is to purchase full fat, organic varieties from grass fed animals when possible. Even then my consumption is limited to cream in my coffee and the very occasional cheese.

I would love to be able to buy more items from Whole Foods. Just look at their beautiful produce.

But even if I cannot afford to buy all my food there I at least try to take advantage of sales and focus on items they offer that are more difficult to find elsewhere. In the next couple of days I will post the recipe for meatloaf that I used with some of the awesome grass fed ground beef.

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5 Responses to "Paleo & Primal Whole Foods Haul"

Although we don’t have “Wholefoods” the store in the UK we do have Fage TOTAL yoghurt and for some crazy reason it gives me a warm glow to think our paleo communities are linked by foods across the ocean, we are eating the same produce but you are over there and we are here in Yorkshire! I love the colour and depth of whole food and your pictures capture this perfectly. Thank you for sharing your daily dose of beauty, it is appreciated 🙂

I have food allergies to celery ( anaphylaxis), and this is th first bacon I have found that is. Ade from pigs raised on vegetarian feed and without antibiotics and no celery products used in the curing process.